Brighter Future for 4500 Orphan children in India

Often the transition from one phase to another is difficult in life - primary school to secondary school, than later to college followed by getting into careers / jobs. How would one feel when they have to leave their homes and move out of the most comfortable zone of their life?

The transition to post-institution life can be insurmountably difficult. Children are not phased out of their child care home; they have to leave suddenly when they turn 18, and they start jobs with no safety net. This often leads to exploitation. Even children who study further often fall through the cracks and drop out because of financial constraints or no proper guidance and lack of opportunities.

One of the important areas that we work on is providing guidance, support and stability to these kids. We have a 2 fold approach in preparing them - Preparatory program & Aftercare support.

We start working with them, preparing them since they turn 14. We provide them with career awareness programs & orientation, career counselling and financial literacy training. These 4 years are filled with sessions time and again covering the above once they turn 18, we help them transition into decent jobs & careers. The on ground approach is to provide livelihood training and/or higher education support along with job placement. We support them with stay, food, day to day essentials etc. We have supported around 227 children with higher education or Livelihood skill training program last year.

Here are a few of our success stories:

Shrikrishna: He was in a CSA supported Child care Institution since he was in 3^rd grade. Shrikrishna was not keen on further studies and was not interested in studying further. Post 9^th grade we pushed him to study until his 10^th grade and enrolled him to ICICI Skill Academy with various options of courses which he could choose from. Shrikrishna chose to do RAC which is Refrigeration & AC Repair course. It was a 3 months course post which Shrikrishna start working as a freelancer. He now runs his own business in Pune, India and has people working under him.

Akansha: Akansha’s childhood was a roller coaster ride with her losing both her parents at an early age and later moving with her relatives only to end up in a child care home. Akansha was always very passionate about sports and wanted to pursue horse riding as a career. With the child care homes and CSA’s support, Akansha was enrolled for a horse riding course in a well-known sports academy in Madhya Pradesh. With rigorous months of training and Akansha’s never ending confidence in herself, she won her maiden silver in a prestigious championship of Madhya Bharat equestrian. Akansha is now training herself for state level championship programs.

True joy, real prosperity, and lasting happiness is possible when all of us come together to take care of each other, respect each other’s rights and help each other grow. #DaanUtsav, earlier known as ‘Joy of Giving’ gives each and every one of us an opportunity to do something good for our fellow citizens. 

At CSA, every year, we take part in the festival of giving with various activities taking place in the different states in India that we work in namely- Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Goa & Odisha.

About the Campaign: This year’s mantra of the campaign was #WeGiveToo and all the activities revolved around giving the children of our Child Care Institutes a different experience and engaging them in activities which made them socially more responsible, aware & gave them an opportunity to give back in their own ways.

As part of the DAAN Utsav activity our central staff team visited one of the Aftercare Homes in Mumbai (Institutions for older girls without any parental or guardian support) and we were exposed to such mind boggling talent. The whole experience was surreal and we interacted with these adolescent girls who had multiple talents.

We engaged in activities such as Diya Painting, Jewellery making from recycled paper. They also had set-up a small exhibition wherein we could purchase bags, Jewellery, Pouches & Diyas made by them.

The beads seen in the picture that have been used to make bracelets are made out of magazines and later pasted and painted. They usually take a week or more to create these beads.

It was such an amazing experience to learn the art of jewellery making from them and share an afternoon full of laughter & giggles.

And most importantly, we could experience the ‘joy of giving’ by spending time with these girls and seeing their confidence & skill.